BHM: Good Black News Celebrates Carter G. Woodson, “The Father of Black History”

Happy Black History Month 2021! The team at Good Black News is excited as ever to celebrate and explore the events, movements and people who have contributed indelibly to African American life and culture throughout the centuries.

Today we start by honoring Carter G. Woodson, the man responsible for creating and advancing the concept of having a specific time every year nationally to recognize the achievements of Black people in the U.S.

Known as “The Father of Black History,” author and historian Carter G. Woodson was born in 1875 to formerly enslaved parents who were never taught to read and write.

To make ends meet, Woodson often had to forgo school for farm or mining work, but he was encouraged to learn independently and eventually earned advanced degrees from the University of Chicago and Harvard University.

In 1915 he helped found the Journal of Negro History, (see issues of the Journal here) and starting in 1926 he developed and promoted the second week of February as Negro History Week.

In 1933, Woodson published The Mis-Education of the Negro, a book where he argues that African Americans were being indoctrinated instead of taught in American schools, and being led to view themselves as inferior. Woodson encourages his readers to become autodidacts and to “do for themselves”, regardless of what they learn in the educational system.

February officially became Black History Month across the nation in 1976.

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